Urban Alienation: Cultural Carnage and Alleycats

It's no wonder then that so many of us choose to bury our heads in the proverbial sand of cycling. I certainly do. It's far easier to live in a world where "tragic" means a really ugly fixed-gear conversion and "scandal" means your favorite rider has just tested positive for EPO. That's why when something enters the world of cycling that forces me to look beyond it and contemplate the larger issues I become especially angry. Like a child shut in his bedroom listening to music, I dread that moment when someone pounds on the door and tells me to turn it off and get to work.

The latest knock at the door came yesterday, in the form of an alleycat:

I'd seen this particular one advertised on the various bike blogs for quite awhile now. Apart from briefly sighing to lament the tiresome formula of pop culture appropriation to which all these alleycats seem to adhere (in this case it was the re-working of the Morbid Angel logo) I really didn't think anything of it. By the way, if you don't know what an alleycat is, it's something that used to be a messenger race, then became a race for people who copy messengers, and then became a race for people who copy people who copy messengers. And if you don't know who Morbid Angel are, they're a band. For every genre of music, there's a band that officially carves out the heart of that genre, discards it, and dances around in the carcass campily like Buffalo Bill from "Silence of the Lambs." Morbid Angel were that band for the subgenre of a subgenre called "grindcore," and they excised from it any social consciousness bands like Napalm Death may have had, slipped on the carcass of screaming and speed like a stage costume, and very successfully upped the ante of metal idiocy.

At any rate, I didn't give much thought to the "Metal Rage" alleycat, until I was checking in with trackosaurusrex (home of the exclamation point!) and saw this:

Clearly this wasn't just another contrived alleycat with a cutesy theme. This was full-bore, white-knuckle, hunched-over-the-neck-of-the-guitar, hair-swinging, cock-rocking stupidity. Aghast, I followed the link to the report, and learned this:

At each checkpoint you had to do a task like sign the manifest in your own real blood, bring roadkill, shotgun a beer, get slapped by a groupie, be anointed with fake blood and let all but 30 psi out of your tire.

I also read this comment from a participant on one of the sponsor's sites:

Jack’s arm looked so fucking nasty. I watched it happen to. They gave us razor blades and said “cut yourself” and Jack pulled some fucking suicidal shit. His arm split open and he screamed…

I listened to Bathory and Dissectiont the whole night.

Now, as I mentioned, I was aghast. And the reason for my aghastation (sure, why not?) wasn't the theme, or the makeup, or the clothes. It wasn't even the idea of people cutting themselves open for what is essentially a big Easter Egg hunt. I mean, sure, all those things were pretty stupid, but that's not what was bugging me. It was the dead animals. I kept going back to the pictures of the dead animals.

I'm the first to admit that I'm a simpering wussbag when it comes to animals. I can't even watch a dog food commercial without getting emotional. And forget Animal Planet--all it takes is one story of a cat with cancer or something to bring me to my knees as I press my hands together and beg of the heavens, "Why? Dear God, why!?!" But still, I do have some perspective on it. I realize at least part of the reason for my extreme sensitivity in this area is because I'm so insensitive in others, and that I've sort of unevenly focussed all my compassion on the animal kingdom. I guess that's why I can shrug my shoulders at a person in distress, but if I see a pigeon with a limp or something I need to go have a drink. I also realize that I come from a place where the death of animals is not a part of my day-to-day life. Maybe if I'd grown up on a farm or something and chicken decapitations were as commonplace as mail delivery I'd see things a little differently.

Still, I think no matter where you are on the animal sensitivity spectrum, pictures like these should at least raise an eyebrow. I couldn't help wondering if at least some of the "roadkill" hadn't been alive before these people go their hands on it. (In fact, I have reason to believe this may indeed be the case.) And even if none of the "roadkill" had been killed by the participants, surely when a group of grown men are riding around New York City playing with bloody animals it is symptomatic of something in the "bike culture" that goes beyond simple stupidity. Here's another picture from the flickr page linked to on the trackosaurusrex site:

I've taken the liberty of annotating this particular photo in order to draw attention to the bloodied animal, the depraved expression, and the torso in dire need of a manssiere.

And here's a closer look at one of the photos from above:

I suppose if I heard about a bunch of 14-year-old kids in rural Kansas riding around doing something like this I might understand it. I've been to rural Kansas, and while it certainly has a certain beauty I could also imagine it breeding a certain restlessness and destructive boredom in an adolescent hungry for social and intellectual stimulation. However, it's much harder to understand something like this when the participants are a bunch of adults in one of the cultural capitals of the world, who have thousands of dollars of high-end bicycle equipment, and, at least in some cases, also have expensive educations and white-collar office jobs as well as access to all the socially and intellectually stimulating pursuits those assets afford them.

Could they not think of anything better to do with their bikes or themselves? Moreover, if any of these people actually have romantic partners, what kind of exchanges did they have with theirs the next morning?

"What did you do last night, honey?"

"A few of us stopped by an art gallery. Then we had dinner, talked for awhile, and saw a really great show. What did you do?"

"I pulled the wing off a dead pigeon, shotgunned a beer, and wrote my name in blood."

Then again, I guess I shouldn't be surprised when people choose the stupid route. If you want to race your bike, why should you enter an actual race? Those are hard, and sometimes require you to get up early. Why not do an alleycat instead? And if you want to have a visceral experience, why go hunting or fishing? That would require you to think, and to learn something, and to deal with the consequences of taking a life. Plus, you can't really do it while dressed as your favorite Norwegian black metal hero. Indeed, you can only sit in your office in front of you iMac for so long before you feel the desperate need to legitimize your brand-new knuckle tattoos by wrapping them around a bloody animal while dressed as the people who live the lives which you covet yet of which you are also afraid.

I hope I'm wrong in my suspicion that any animal, no matter how low on the food chain, might have been killed just for an alleycat. But even if I am wrong, I think a bunch of yuppies riding around playing with roadkill represents a new low. I'd love to see some comments from the participants, who can perhaps show me that I'm overreacting and can prove me wrong on all counts. I mean, I must be, right? After all King Kog, home of the vegan toe straps, was one of the sponsors.

Oh well, I'm glad all the frat boys are still managing to have fun after graduation.

Self harm and animal sacrifice? I know the cliches were most likely deliberate, but it's like they read "The trustafarian's guide to being rock n' roll". Lame. The bitterness has never been more deserved.

What these idiots need is to get dropped from the pack into a headwind 75km from home just as it starts to rain. These guys are pussies and will never know what it means to really 'suffer' on the bike. All this 'hardcore' posing is laughable.

BSNYC, you just don't get art. This reminds me of the famous Sniffy-the-rat incident in Toronto in the 90s. A rat was placed on a canvas below a 50lb concrete block, and the block was to be dropped on Sniffy live at the art opening.

Alas, due to protesters, Sniffy was freed and spent the rest of his life in a witness protection program, or running free on some rural farm, but most likely just died chewing on an electrical cord.

This little gem was buried in there, but it really nails the race flyer to the church door -- Bravo BSNYC!:

"By the way, if you don't know what an alleycat is, it's something that used to be a messenger race, then became a race for people who copy messengers, and then became a race for people who copy people who copy messengers."

it's not even about suffering on a bike though. It's just about a pretty lame night. If you have to plan your wild night down to cutting yourself at checkpoint moronic, well, that doesn't sound exciting to me at all. And the whole animal thing is stupid as well.

Back in MY day, a friend would crawl in through your window, announce they had some drugs, you would walk somewhere but who knew where and something fun happened, not the least of which was because you had enough brains to to find things amusing.

But I guess people not being able to think for themselves is what gives Bike Snob so much material... hmmm

Seems that there is a grand total of one proponent of the first annual Jeffrey Dahmer celebratory Alleycat; the rest of the "participants" are most likely still jiggling about in their beds, shaking with the DTs and embarrassed out of their minds.

seriuosly though these people are to bicycling what burningman is to societyburnt out white people playing dress up and having no conscious or consideration of their actions and the impact on anything else(much like there repressed non-fantasy life but with more alcohol/barbituates, leather, spandex and fur)i do not understand them and find myself to hold an unrelenting distain, disappointment and something that feels like hatred towards themwhat i do understand is that a lot of times the things you find the most unsettling about others are the same qualities that you are ashamed of yourselfi am not saying that bike snob feels lame for his office job or time spent in front of the imac and wants for a more primal experience himself, i just think that maybe next vacation weekend or maybe a waldenesque trip to the woods and a reconsideration of lifes detication is a more appropriate escape, you can always ride your bike therebs i love you thocome to colorado there are a lot of berries to forage this time of year-yours extremely creepily

I'm with you, this is over the line, be it killing animals or morons playing with roadkill. Forwarded your post to the ASPCA, hopefully its just the roadkill scenario and these dumb fucks catch something nasty.

Since you're asking Prolly, I was at a house party on Saturday night, but I'm afraid it wasn't ironically themed (unless drink is a theme) so I must be a hopeless drone wasting my life.

Just to be clear, I don't have anything against people getting their kicks how they want, I just get the feeling that the whole thing was staged so as to have scars/flicr photos to show off afterwards more than for actual enjoyment.

you all need to shut the fuck up and go back to bumblefuck USA and keep riding your fuckiing hipster bikes and let the people in the illest city ever do what we do best.... shit you've never seeen before. calm the fuck down and stop shitting your pants, it was just a race, albeit one with a retarted premise, but goddamn, hop off already!! i think you guys are just jealous..........

Americans are as you tell girly men. Except women, who think they are men. You as people are copulated. When time to get seriousness we in motherland cook and eat Republicans. They taste just like moose.

Bike Snob you are so righteous - and of course the first part of righteous is 'right'.

It's a shame there's no cure for the common idiot.

PS You'll be glad to know I finally nagged my wife into removing her pie plate from her cross bike despite her plea that "it stops the chain from going into the spokes". Of course as soon as her chain jumps off into the spokes I'm a dead man. Let's hope my carcass doesn't get used as a 'token' in an alleycat race for yupsters.

this is only somewhat related but fits in with the whole animal planet theme. Last night on my ride I stopped to watch a fox chase a jack-rabbitt. The fox saw me, stopped chasing the rabbitt and walked across the road and sat down about 3 feet from me and stared at me for about 3 minutes, then got up and walked up to me, around my bike and walked away. It was pretty cool. Also Snob, take it easy on us rural folks...your narrowly constructed description of kids in Kansas drawn to animal sacrafice would indicate that your primary source of information on rural living is repeated viewings of Footloose, stick to what you know (making fun of hipsters in NYC) ...we're not all PBR swilling, truck driving, chicken disembowling rednecks dreaming of dirty dancing and cable.

prolly-i have seen you here and there on the web. yer the guy that just started riding track bikes less than 3 yrs ago, but have somehow devolved into doing really basic bmx moves on a bastardized track bike, and posting them on the web. why? i wonder? and this whole metal/track bike thing, it doesn't make sense, nor is it interesting, or funny, or really anything other than stupid. that "race" w/the idiots and the blood and the drunk people, wtf is that? aren't you like 30 or something? have you ever raced? have you ever been a mssnger? i am going to go ahead and answer for you: no to both. oh wait, alleycat racing, yeah, i did that 14 yrs ago when mssngers did it, not drunk fat guys w/stupid bikes w/gring guards, riser bmx bars, and all this other stupid crap color coordinated spoke card crap. move on prolly, take yer posse w/you. leave bikes to people who really ride them, not dipshits that just drag them from dumpster, to parking lot, to dive bar, to their apartment, etc.. what a bunch of fucking idiots.

I'm different! I do things you won't. I cut myself and sign my name in blood. It shows disregard of my body. I pick up roadkill. Others would say that's gross. I swear. I'm different than everyone else! Believe me. You're an office drone. I'm different.

Look, while it is true I have shot a few signs in south central Kansas, I am not sure I remember me or any of my friends picking up road kill. Sure, metal rained, but for fux sakes! If some alleycat picks up a did chipmunk and brings it to a check point...SO HELP ME

Au contraire. I went to go see Children of the Corn with my dad when I was a kid, and he told me not to go, but I made him take me anyway, and then I made him leave in like 15 minutes I was so scared.

I also once got a McRib about 20years ago. I must've been one of three people to get those. I said, Dad, I want a McRib, and he said, Don't be a dumbass, get a cheeseburger. And I said, Dad, no, I really want one, they're delicious, please, please I want a McRib. He said, I'm not getting you a McRib, get a cheeseburger, if you get a McRib you have to eat it. And I said, Dad, please, please, I want a McRib, McRib, McRib, McRib, McRib, McRib, please, get me a McRib, please. And he got me a McRib. And the thing was just pre-formed mystery meat to look like a rib (I was a little kid, dude, how should I know?). And I started crying before I even swallowed the first bite.

So what's the point? Basically, I guess, I was a p~ssy as a little kid.

anon 1:37 - Thanks for keeping me in your thoughts. But wouldn't antf irst be more appropriate? I guess if you're a fan enough to get my bikesnob comments handle tattoed on you knuckles I shouldn't be so picky.

Here's another thought, how about a picture of an ant on the fist knuckle then 1st on the next 3. on the other hand have isa and an arrow pointing down towards your vagina, that way you can achieve both the firs tant and the urap ussy all in one.

I often wonder why, in any "subculture," it isn't enough for some folks just to enjoy the thing itself - the cycling. Why it has to become about one-upmanship, about style on top of cycling. For me, at least, it's the ride that's the obsession. This other stuff is just so much junior high fashion show.

(and I realize that's going to sound like a pose of its own kind, but I mean it in earnest)

Geeze. Hasn't anyone heard of metal? Ozzy Osbourne? This is what metal kids do, the play with dead things and roll around in their own blood cause it's exciting. Humans don't really chase down and slaughter buffalo anymore so you've got to get your carnage kicks somewhere right? At least the kids are on bikes.

anon 1:52 - to be a subculcture, you have to differentiate yourself one way or another. If all cycling subcultures just enjoy the cycling in itself, they'd be one big culture. I think the problem is that messengers were a subculture, that further got subdivided into messenger-imitating hipsters, and we are now witnessing another division, the hipster messenger wannabes who aren't afraid to pick up roadkill. Can't wait for the next installement.

As someone who is from rural Kansas, there is no big mystery here. Fourteen year olds who might do shit like this are encouraged to move along to the big cities, where they are believed to have some chance of fitting in. I am not saying that is a good way to deal with mentally defective children, but it does happen that way.

The fact that I am from rural Kansas is in no way a reflection on my behavior as a child. I was merely encouraged to move to some other town.

"But Alley Cats won't truly have jumped the shark until Sarah Palin shows up for a ride and field dresses a slaughtered moose." Thank you, I've been wanting to throw an alleycat here in Alaska for sometime now, I have a theme I would of course require the racers to kill their own moose because this is Alaska after all. I'm kidding some "hipster" twit will more likely throw one before I do being a boring old married fart these days. Yes, we've got 'em here and they outnumber real messengers 4-1

Shoulda done the alleycat on all BMX bikes...then the whole juvenile delinquent theme would have fit together perfectly. At one of the checkpoints they could have made the participants huff paint and then get back on the bike.

As a matter of fact, now that I look at the larger photos, some of those idiots look familiar. I'm pretty sure "Man Boob" is the moron who puked on my car at the prom. We always wondered what happened to old Dink.

so it's people imitating people imitating messengers imitating metal kids? Getting confusing. Who really cares? He said no animals were killed. Speaking up for the mass minority here, it sounds like a thoroughly retarded fun time. If you're into that.

i don't realize why everyone cares so much about this "juvenile deliquency." bmx bikes are sweet! (and so are bmc's, for that matter). If loving the bicycle is just about loving bicycling, what's the harm in this?- this is a creative idea instead of the tired old messenger-themed alleycat (although those are fun too). if you don't want to come to a metal-themed race or disapprove of it's theme, metal, a subculture that in its own is about excess and grim/dark/death-centered stuff, then simply don't participate.

if someone had fun in a way that you might not have fun, and didn't hurt anything in the process, there are much more productive ways to go about talking shit than in the comments section of bikesnob anonymously.

perhaps to contrast this tomfoolery you'll go and put together your own race, and it can have adult sponsors like G.Q., Mini Cooper, Apple, Sperry Top-siders, etc. and you could do tasks like purchase a house in the suburbs, obey traffic lights, yeild to cars, ride only hybrid bikes with 40 psi tires on the sidewalks, collecting work clothes (biz-casual of course) in yr panniers, etc.

...Bike races of all sorts are fun: Cross races, BMX races, Messenger races, Crits, whatever...I've done them, they don't suck. In fact. I've never felt bored with the objective in hand so much that I felt the urge to throw in some self-mutilation or animal sacrifice. Be it road kill or DOA, playing with dead animals is fucked up and seriously not at all humorous. You guys must truly be hardcore.

The self-mutilation thing I'm okay with because if you are that moronic to begin with, maybe it wouldn't be a bad thing that in the rush-of-it-all a few of you had mistakenly cut too deep and bled out before reaching the finish line. Survival of the fittest, survival of the ones born with simple common sense.

Speaking of how much hardcore fun these guys seemed to have been having; I wonder if they've done anything truly hardcore on a bike. For example: barreling down a winding decent at 45mph when you've out geared yourself? Or been caught in the middle of a sketchy overlap situation in a miss-and-out race at the local velodrome (for those of you "trackies" that don't know what that is, it's the origin of that fugly thing between your legs sans the 1"-risers and Ourys). And I’m not referring to toe-overlap, wannabes.

You've got pent up quarterlife aggression, so what. You listen to Slayer because your parents neglected your feelings as a kid, they didn't let you take that karate class and sent you to a top-rated college to study art history, tuition free. I feel sorry for you. Seriously.

It's not the homegrown Kansas Kids that are tearing the heads off pigeons (first off, pigeons don't really exist much in the Midwest) being a former Midwesterner I would know. I've been a part of the "fixie" community in Philly, LA and now SF and I have to say the "new-breed" of hipster-fixters is a strange phenomena. It's like track bikes are the new Marliyn Manson for misunderstood "kids" on Prozac. No offense to Manson fans or people who seriously need Prozac, but: "when you live with the Apes of man, it's hard to be clean." If you get my drift.

I wish the apocalyptic wrath of pigeon swarming on all of you teen-angst posers. Let them poke out the eyes of the pretenders.

That or I hope you catch a crab the next time you're out-geared cruising downhill from whatever Vegan diner that you’re coming from. I’m sure you’re parents will front the dentist’s bill when your front teeth are left on Cobble Hill. Enjoy the reconstructive surgery, because I don’t know anything more hardcore than having your parents front for that.

"a bunch of adults in one of the cultural capitals of the world, who have thousands of dollars of high-end bicycle equipment, and, at least in some cases, also have expensive educations and white-collar office jobs"

i think you have found the problem right there. as much as i like the stereotype of the inbred, redneck rural sociopath, the truth is that most rural people have a basic respect for life.

on the other hand, inbred redneck white collar office drones would make perfect SS officers, as they have been 'educated' in little more than machiavelli and excel macros.

having an expensive bicycle or, dare i say it, living in the 'right' city, does not make one a moral person, any more than buying a crass t-shirt makes you an anarchist.

i am puzzled, mr snob, though. as i ride my bike in my flyover state, i am incessantly confronted with roadkill, an reminded that i, myself, could be somewhat flat were it not for the grace of god. do you not have this daily affirmation in 'the city'?

Funny you'd ask. Sleeping hard after busting my ass working at a real roadrace all day, and most of the day before. Amazingly, nobody stopped to cut themselves, get slapped by groupies, sign their name in blood, or to pick up roadkill, the rabies threat being what it is out here in pickup truck-driving flyover country, West bumf*** D.C.

Although the guy driving the Sag Wagon for the Cat 4 race claimed he was picking up roadkill, we think he was exaggerating.

and all y'all can just shut the fuck up about this race - if you like road racing or triathlons or whatever better than something like this, go do that. who cares if you like stupid fun (i sure do) or knuck tats. sorry you stupid fucks are so damn cool

and props to prolly for doing something new on a track bike - what have you ever done new except been the first on nashbars email list to buy illuminated bar ends or wireless cyclocomputers. good for you

Brilliant stuff Snob. This Lord of The Flies behavior has more to do with the human condition than it does with geography or accessible culture. It is the ugly truth that animals are really better beings than we are.

It's amusing to see how many of you think they know these people who raced. Like you need the internet to finally voice your pent-up aggression. Bisickle, you're the perfect example of kind of pretentious snob who needs to validate their identity by posting on Bike Snob. Claiming that everyone who lives in a city like New York is a trust fund kid. People work their asses off in this City to make it and this kind of release is one way to have a good time with friends.

Why would you assume they've never raced? Or hit 45mph on a descent? Or some other near wreck on turn 4? Do you know them? Probably not. I know for a fact that a few of those guys are hard-as-nails cyclists who could destroy anything with 2 wheels. Including your front wheel in a miss or win in out. So why are you so hung up on it?

Because you feel threatened in some way and your insecurities come out. That or you're too old to be able to let loose again and have fun without hating on everything. Just remember, there are always people who are faster and more experienced than you, so all your talk is bullshit.

And who thought that Morbid Angel was a grindcore band? Death Metal! Like that band, Death!

At least Prolly has the balls to show up to this comment section and defend his actions against a very hostile crowd. I'd like to see some of you go on Fixter sites and talk shit about them there, instead of in front of your choir.

"you can only sit in your office in front of you iMac for so long before you feel the desperate need to legitimize your brand-new knuckle tattoos by wrapping them around a bloody animal while dressed as the people who live the lives which you covet yet of which you are also afraid."

prolly, sat night i was wrenching on the bike and getting ready for CX. sunday the beers were well deserved. maybe you should take yourself more seriously because that was some of the dumbest stuff i've ever seen from the ny cool school.

Wild berry foraging in Colorado this time of year? I would have thought that was over by now. Perhaps lower foothill foraging or on the margins of the plains? It must be downright autumnal in those parts about now. I believe it is wild berry foraging season along the Fish House Road off of the 1/9 truck route in New Jersey. BSNYC, you should check it out. Take the PATH to Hoboken, p/u the monorail to the JC elevator and cycle on over to the FHR.

I am so tired of you people coming to New York and insisting on doing stuff and letting loose. You're paying all this money to re-grow up where I grew up, and frankly you're better at it than me (I was only 14 for god's sake). Imagine the smartest most creative kids from everywhere converged on your town to be cooler than you were in high school. Makes we wanna son you for your North Face.

I remember another Canadian thing: the tv show "Mr Dressup." He was a hell of a lot more creative and original than those alleycat tossers playing dressup with their metal clothes straight out of the hot topic tickle trunk. and that show was aimed at 5 year olds.

ryanfromdeland-you are a tool, and you are from florida, and you are a tool. a metal themed race? say that, slowly, to yourself, and if you weren't an idiot-from florida, you would know just how fucking stupid that sounds. so shut it. and prolly-whoah-4 years, my mistake. and had multiple bikes? cool! keep doing half ass bmx tricks on your big bmx bike w/skinny tires, and wait! there is more, it doesn't coast!! wow! so fucking rad and cutting edge, i mean, bleeding edge stuff here. so cool and rad. you know what the hardest part of doing a barspin is? telling your parents you're gay. and you my friend, are gay.

Sonned is something white kids who went to high school in Manhattan in the early to mid 90's used to express the humiliating feeling accompanying the theft of your North Face jacket, or any such disrespectful incident. The highest form would be sonning one in front of one's whole crew (of like-minded buddies). Synonyms include herbing, owning, making someone your biotch. Sonning has no basis in hip hop or African American culture.

firstoff i'm not really an investment banker - that was sarcasm - i'm actually closer to a mix between two other things you hate, a tall bike rider and a trickster, neither of these however, in my experience, have ever been confused with a yuppie.

yes i'm from florida and florida is way cooler than NY (about -100000 degrees cooler). Know what else is from florida? two aforementioned death metal bands - morbid angel and death.

it's cool if yr proud of where yr from, because i am too - in fact i'd bet money (that is, if i believed in money - im also an anarchist) that i have more fun than you do because cycling isn't such a serious thing to me.

I checked out your blog for the first time in a long time. No more music reviews? ...any new dubstep artists worth mentioning for those of us out in Cow Town? Say what you want about Prolly's taste in bikes and dead vermin, but he does have good taste in music.

I'm a different anon than the one you're talking about, but I would find it harder to tell my parents I have an internet persona. You wouldn't last a second in true anarchy, nor would I. In case you were joking about the anarchy thing, making fun of yourself isn't funny when you actually suck.

well of course there are many different (typically hot-topic and other market-driven) ideas of "anarchy". as in many people have a misconception that anarchists stand for chaos disorder, etc. whereas classical anarhism (read the wikipedia article) i.e. anarchism based on the writings of goldman, kropotkin, rocker, bakunin, etc. are all about creating a society that doesn't need laws - relying more on cooperation, autonomous self-organization, and the ol' LEMA (liberty, equality and mutual aid).

just because i'm an idealist doesn't mean i think it will happen soon, although it has happened several times in history (see: spanish civil war/cnt/fia, etc) and in a microcosmic sense it happens even with the little "take a penny, leave a penny" thing you see in convenience stores.

i don't hope to "convert" you, nor do i expect you to take any of what i say seriously, but i intend not to be misrepresented as an "internet persona" from florida.

MORE SUNSHINE // LESS STATEup the crust punks with trust funds lolllzzz

prolly, compared to ryanfromdeland, you are almost cool. florida blows, dipshit. tall bikes are stupied, and you just called yourself a trickster? get a job, one that won't wear out your kneepads, one that doesn't force you to steal all the scope from whoever's couch you are crashing on.

"At each checkpoint you had to do a task like sign the manifest in your own real blood, bring roadkill, shotgun a beer, get slapped by a groupie, be anointed with fake blood and let all but 30 psi out of your tire."

That sounds like cross, except they'd be running their tires way too hard.

In the spirit of hate, I thought I'd add that NYC is filled with the most conformist, self-conscious people who can't make a move without thinking of all the different ways they might be described in the third person. And why does everything have to be documented and end up online or in a glossy or not so glossy art publication or gallery or whatever? I guess we'll never know about the unrecorded cool things out there, but I think people should stop documenting their experiences and stop acting like they're being documented. And if people were really hip, they'd set up shop in Newark (NJ, not Delaware). Just follow the Fish House Road to the Pulaski Highway.

i may like tricks (coming firstly from bmx) but i can hang up my bike tomorrow or go get a *real* bikebut you'd still be an asshole

and florida blows? where are you from?!we've made what we've got here, if you think you personally kick ass for living in some hip metropolis know full well it was like that before you had anything to do with it and would be just the same if you weren't there.

Way to go everyone for flaming a barely publicized hipster CAT4 race after the fact. I guess that's the point, though... sadly. It's just better when it's anonymous, I feel bad for prolly, et al., because they just wanted to have fun and helped to clean up the streets. Next time, hold it during the morning sometime between 630-1000 and have a BSNYC theme and dress up as CX weekend warriors, drink Rogue, and wear helmets.

I'm not one to leave comments on peoples blogs. Why would they care what someone whom they have never met thought of what they have posted. That said, I agree with you 100% in regards to todays posting. the very idea of collecting road kill sickens me, and i'm not one who is easily sickened. I see road kill almost everyday and it makes me think that we as a people have lost touch with our place on this earth with and have created a callus disregard with all of the other inhabitants who live here with us.

Just a head's up, too old? I'm 24. I paid my way through college, have been hopping around "trying to make it" like you say. Across the globe a couple times in three years. The only thing constant is the bike I bring with me. I race, and am not fast-self admittedly. I used to be heavy into the fixie scenes in my old hometowns, and am simply angry at the progression. I love how diverse it's become, but there is a certain avenue that erks me, and this posting obviosuly, blatantly hit that nerve with a razor sharp wire-cutter.

I think the people I spoke about, if they are anything like the people I've come across associated with that "scene": more than likely resemble the stereotype I'm bashing. I'm not bashing all fixie riders, because I've been one since I was 8-years-old. That would be hypocritical. I was the odd kid out who rode bikes when all of my friends in Philly were skating.

I'm welcome to diversity of all kinds and the spread of the two wheeled cause. I just have a feeling they aren't helping much. People on the outside see that, cops on the outside see that: and next thing you know your next big group ride carnival has task force waiting at the end of the 4th street tunnel, waiting. If you were in LA when that happened, then you understand.

If I could post a Spock from Star Trek hand-gesture I would, but ride long with posture!

Don't give frat boys a bad name. Saturday night I was having pizza with two of my own frat brothers after volunteering for Denver's Tour de Fat. It was a collection of mainly white people playing dress up and drinking beer. I guess it wasn't quite as cool as this alleycat since no one was cutting themselves, seeing who could be more gutterpunk, or playing with dead animals.

I still claim being hardcore though, cuz once I was riding with my race team and my buddy grant decapitated a pigeon when it flew into his bladed spoke front wheel.

I feel bad for Prolly, but if it wasnt him, it'd be someone else. Someone that doesnt really get it, but is totally siked. Same shit with Skating in the 80's, posers were abound. I saw those pix and just thought it was the lamest shit in the world, but they had fun...so who gives a shit. Yeah he is hipster, and yeah the BMX tricks are lame...and saying "sonned" is REALLY lame...and the alley cats are super lame....it's like CAT 8 type shit. I think it's gonna get a lot worse though....then Prolly will realize just how lame he was in 2008.

Hey florida guy, you seem to have an advanced understanding of anarchy. It's good to read lots of stuff about impossible utopian ideals which require the suspension of human nature. It's up there with being a Star Wars expert or a Gnome scholar. -Freddy Berckx

Dear internet personalities. This is Jack, the winner of the metal race. If you'd like to come ask me about the reality of the situation of this race and why I think it was a great time and well planned, please feel free to order from mighty diamond, salad queen, urban rustic, or teddy's tonight until around 10:45.

Not only will I engage you in a civil, friendly and informed discourse in real life, but I will also bring you food. Good food. Hopefully shortly after the time you order it. Maybe even with a smile on my face. Because I ride my bike for a living and that gets me stoked. Have a good evening.

I was in a scavenger hunt once that involved obtaining road kill. But... we live in the middle of Suffolk County. It's boring as shit out there most of the time, and road kill can remain in the street for days. I can't imagine it being easy to find fresh roadkill that's still bleeding. Unless that's people blood... but I'm doubting it. If you really want to be metal, don't kill animals and ride trendy hipster bikes, do what Dead did.

This was not a cycling related event. It was a show for all of us. Please metal alleycat riders, accept this attention and discussion and feel superior. You are now +1 above all other allycat riders and +2 above the average fixie rider and best of all... +3 above the average cyclist. You are a winner, mommy and daddy love you.

bgw - I was wavering between going with ant1st, which would have been most applicable to comments on this blog, and ant1, which makes more sense for life outside this blog (not that I have a life outside this blog, but I may someday). ant1 won (came in 1st?). But worry not, ant1st is not going away.

The Metal alleycat, also lame. And I hope most of the participants meet with untimely deaths. And if they did kill any of the "road kill" maybe they too will become road kill due to the random act of a cager (car).

i have nothing to justify other than the ludocrisy of animal killing post-adolesceant jerk-offery. i guess it's because i'm "insecure and feel threatened." Give me a break.

i have no qualms with NYC. i love the place, i've had far too much grey's papaya in my day...but...i have a problem with people, be it cyclists or cell-phone jabbing, lexus-driving spawns that kill innocent animals for nothing more than "a good time."

fuck's sake, go watch a goddamned movie or something.

enjoy cutting yourself with razor blades and sacrificing pigeons in the name of hardcore.

Holy shit, pushing 200 comments. How is doing an alleycat for the photo-ops any different than chronicling your life on a blog? Granted it all looks pretty stupid, but how is a legitimate race any less ego-centric?

I think some of you are overreacting to the killing of one single pigeon. I arrange the mass killing of many pigeons each year for the Wyomissing Pennsylvania Woodsmen's pigeon hunt. Since there aren't a lot of pigeons to be found in the vicinity of Wyomissing, I take my van around New York City and net live birds for the hunt. This is not some mindless, barbaric outlet of the rich. It is a longstanding tradition among the Wyomissing aristocracy to participate in a pigeon hunt and then bring their kill to their wives and daughters to properly butcher the squab for a feast at country estate supper clubs. Seated at long tables, you can still smell a bit of the old growth Pennsylvania woods. On chilly autumn days it is not uncommon to smell the scent of Pigeon a la Maitre-Jacques or a la Richelieu as well as creamed corn coming from the weedy, marshed interzones that divide pastoral Wyomissing from its more urban communities. It is not a cruel practice, as my Croatian father once instructed me, but a way of honoring the birds in the company of noble men served by their dutiful women. As he once said, "What is good in Istria is better in Wyomissing." It is as much a natural part of me as flight is to the pigeon.

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About Me

While I love cycling and embrace it in all its forms, I'm also extremely critical. So I present to you my venting for your amusement and betterment. No offense meant to the critiqued. Always keep riding!